DIY Vegan- Have Fun & Save $$!

Lately I've been into DIY (Do It Yourself) culinary projects:

• Rolling my own sushi using recipes from Veganomicon: The Ultimate Vegan Cookbook
• Making my own seed milk with a nut milk bag. I recently tried making hemp milk this weekend. The verdict: super fast and easy to make (just blend...straining is optional) and very healthy (lot's of omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids!).
• Making soy yogurt in the Euro Cuisine Yogurt Maker that I got Danny for his birthday. We found that to make yogurt with soy milk, we have to strain it in paper coffee filters for an hour or so after incubation to thicken it. The result: rich, creamy greek-style yogurt!
• Aging raw cashew cheese using this recipe from Rawmazing. Perhaps I didn't let the sprouted wheat berries ferment long enough, because my cashew mixture didn't have an aged cheesy flavor. I added some onion powder, scallion, parsley, salt, pepper, and nutritional yeast and voila! - herbed cashew ricotta.

I certainly save money going the homemade route. I also feel this sense of accomplishment in doing so. How many people can say they ferment homemade yogurt overnight? 

Last weekend I made a complete raw meal to let everyone sample at my aunt's BBQ. I finally bought a spiralizer (see the photo at left), and I love it! It is really easy to use and takes seconds to clean. It quickly cuts vegetables into long spaghetti-like strands or into thin chip shapes, making raw vegetables easier to chew and digest. Since I got zucchini in my CSA box last week, I made zucchini spaghetti using my spiralizer. I made a raw marinara sauce with fresh tomatoes, sundried tomatoes, bell peppers, and herbs and "not meat balls" from walnuts and herbs. Both recipes were from Raw Food Made Easy For 1 or 2 People. Everyone who tried the dish loved it and thought that it tasted very similar to real pasta. (I even served the spaghetti to Danny's 5 year old brother a few days later and he seemed to enjoy it once he got over the idea of eating "cold pasta.") I was able to use the abundance of arugula in my garden to make arugula pesto. I tweaked the recipe a bit by using only 2 cloves of raw garlic and omitting the cooked garlic, and using 1/4 cup hemp seeds + 1/4 cup nutritional yeast in place of the parmesan cheese. My 93 year old grandpa almost polished off the entire bowl! I'm glad I was able to sneak some more veggies into his diet, because he certainly loves his meat and cheese.

For dessert, I made the melon salad with mint, basil, and lemon vinaigrette that I made for the potluck last weekend. I tried another dessert recipe from Raw Food Made Easy For 1 or 2 People, and like everything else I've tried from that book, it was delicious and easy! I made the Tropical Fruit Tart with a coconut, macadamia, walnut, and date crust and a simple filling of fresh mango blended with dried mango. I garnished it with fresh strawberries and kiwis. This pie was not as rich and filling as the Chocolate Tart I made a few weeks ago, but it was perfect for a light summer dessert. 

I've been trying to plan my meals for the week every Tuesday (that's the day I pick up my CSA veggie box). My CSA box is always a surprise, so I wait to see what I get and then pick up any additional items I need at the grocery store. My garden has been providing me with sugar snap peas, lettuce, arugula, mustard greens, herbs, and now yellow squash and carrots, so I really need to coordinate my meals for the week so that nothing goes to waste! (And luckily nothing ever does go to waste, because I juice any extra fruits and veggies and compost the scraps). Yesterday I made a salad recipe from my CSA's newsletter to use up the radicchio, golden beets, white onion, and scallions from last week's CSA box. I added arugula from my garden, dates, hazelnuts, and used raw cashew cheese in place of the feta. I spiralized the golden beets and added some balsamic vinegar to bring out the natural sweetness of the beets. This recipe is definitely a keeper! 

heart-shaped beet!

Homemade Vegan Yogurt!

Danny mentioned a few months ago that he wanted to start eating yogurt for its probiotic benefits. At nearly $2 a container, soy yogurt was not really in his daily budget. So for his birthday I bought him the Euro Cuisine Yogurt Maker (I know, not your typical gift for a 24 year old guy). It's basically a covered tray that incubates the yogurt at about 100 degrees F for 8-12 hours. The basic process is as follows: bring 40 oz. of milk to a boil, remove from heat and cool to lukewarm, whisk in 6 oz. of plain yogurt with live active cultures, pour into glass containers and incubate in yogurt maker for 8 hours. After 8 hours the yogurt had a sight curdled appearance with liquid that had accumulated on the top of each jar and the yogurt tasted very sour. We refrigerated the yogurt overnight, hoping that it would firm up a bit more and taste better once it cooled. By the next morning the yogurt had not changed, but I was determined to salvage it. I found this article on "Greek-Style Soy Yogurt" on Fat Free Vegan and gave it a try. I fitted a strainer over a bowl and placed 2 large paper coffee filters in the strainer. The I poured my homemade yogurt into the filters and set it in the fridge for about 2 hours. The result: thick and creamy Greek-style soy yogurt that tasted just like the dairy version I used to love. I prepared it in my favorite way with honey, cinnamon, raisins, dates, walnuts, and hemp seeds. The only downside is that the original 42 oz. of yogurt is reduced to about 20 oz. because the liquid "soy whey" is lost after straining. This liquid is probably very nutritious, so I will have to think of a way to use it in my cooking or baking without lending a strong sour flavor. The homemade yogurt was definitely cheaper than store bought yogurt:

32 oz. container of organic vanilla soy milk from Costco: about $1 

6 oz. Whole Soy Plain organic yogurt: $1.69

TOTAL: $2.69 (still much cheaper than the 16 oz. tubs of Greek yogurt I used to buy at around $5 each)!

I can't wait to experiment with different flavors and milks (coconut yogurt...yum!)

Other recipes I tested this week that you MUST try:

• Chocolate Mousse Tart: Another amazing recipe from Jennifer Cornbleet's Raw Made Easy for 1 or 2 People; completely raw, vegan, and gluten-free; a crust made of walnuts, pecans, coconut flakes, dates, and sea salt; a filling made with avocado, dates, cocoa powder, carob powder, and vanilla...sounds like heaven right? 

 fresh sugar snap peas from 

my garden complete the meal!

 

• Quinoa and Sprouted Bean Salad: On my recent trip to Costco I also picked up a huge bag of organic quinoa and TruRoots Organic Sprouted Bean Trio and made this recipe from the TruRoots Facebook group page (I have already made my own adjustments below):

                Simply Sensational TruRoots Sprouted Bean Trio Salad

                Makes 4 to 6 servings

• 1 1/2 cups sprouted beans, cooked according to package directions
• 1 1/2 cups quinoa, cooked 
• ½ cup diced avocado
• ¼ cup diced red onion
• 1 clove garlic minced 
• 2 tablespoons lime juice
• 1-2 teaspoons soy sauce
• ¼ teaspoon or less of chipotle chile powder, depending on heat
• ¼ cup chopped cilantro

• Swiss Chard with Raisins and Pine Nuts: One of Jennifer Cornbleet's recipes...who knew swiss chard could taste so good raw? The swiss chard is marinated in lemon juice, which softens it, giving it a cooked quality. I also added some chopped almonds for extra crunch. 
• Sprouted Wehani Rice: I sprouted Lundberg Wehani Rice in my Easy Sprout Sprouter, but cooked it over low heat for about 10 minutes because it was still a bit crunchy (sprouting definitely cuts down on the 1 hour cooking time!) I tossed in some maple syrup, olive, oil, cranberries, pepitas, and scallions. 
• Sauteed Beet Greens: Don't throw out the leafy tops of your beets! They are super nutritious and taste like spinach or swiss chard when cooked. You can toss them raw into salads, but my beet greens were mature and thus a little bitter. I tweaked this recipe by subbing maple syrup for the sugar and adding a drop of liquid smoke in place of the bacon (I cooked the greens in a tsp. of coconut oil rather than bacon grease). 

This is my first summer as a CSA member and I'm loving it! I get 2 huge bags of organic local vegetables each week for just about $20 a week. You could never walk out of Whole Foods with that much for $20 (and most of it wouldn't be local!) I've been eating so many more vegetables than I usually do, and the variety each week allows me to try new recipes. Last week I got a surprise from my CSA...a pint of strawberries! Apparently the weather has caused a "bad season" for the strawberry crop on Long Island, but these were seriously the best strawberries I've ever had! Aside from joining a CSA, I recently found these articles on ways to save money eating organic and vegan:

• Be a Bargainista
• How to Plan Your Meals & Save Money
• High Quality, Healthy Vegan Diet for $3.33 a Day

Curing fresh olives from my aunt's farm in Sicily

...a treat from my dad's recent trip to Italy